Within The Ashes
by laurelsalexis
Summary: Post-tws. Nothing makes sense with Bucky. He wonders if it'll ever make sense.


**A/N:** This was written a while ago for a team up so there's art that goes with it. If you want to see it then you can go over to ao3. Same fic name, same username.

I totally ignored Civil War for this but some things do kind of still fit with it. It also ignores that Nat x Bruce stuff from AoU. & Brings in some comic influences. This originally had smut but I couldn't get it flow so just use your imagination. All mistakes are my own.

* * *

Bucky.

His name was Bucky.

James Buchanan Barnes to be more accurate.

It didn't matter much what his name was. Not when everything that was in his mind was nothing more than a jumbled mess. So jumbled it hurt to exist, hurt to breathe, hurt to do anything but think of not so pleasant thoughts and the vague memories that came with them. He wanted nothing more than to pretend it all didn't exist and he was someone normal. Oh, what he'd give to be normal.

He wasn't normal and didn't ever think he would be. Not with all that they put him through and not with the metal arm attached to him. It caused him to stick out like a sore thumb and even in the height of summer he was doing absolutely everything to cover it up so that he wouldn't be noticed.

The freedom he obtained was not something he was willing to give up.

Even if that freedom was not true freedom. Not when he was so lost in his mind, lost in trying to remember people, and to find out who he was. A name didn't do much. It did something. It pieced little things together, allowed a small break in his psyche so he could get flashes from his childhood.

Memories such as those were more of a hardship, he'd come to understand.

Just as the names Steve and Natasha only managed to make him more frustrated. When he looked at each of them something ignited within him, something he didn't understand. He wondered if he would ever understand.

Part of him thought that maybe he was better off not understanding at all. If he caused them the pain he assumed he did, from being the Winter Soldier, they were most definitely better off not knowing them. Save them a pain, save himself a pain.

Selfish.

He couldn't help but think that was anything but selfish. They clearly knew exactly who he was and he was the one who didn't want to know them, to escape from the pain. Only for a few moments. The moments before he would go and think about how he deserved to know every single bad thing he did.

That was his punishment, the burden he would carry with him through the rest of his life, nothing that he was ever going to be without.

He was okay with that.

The only thing he actually managed to come to terms with.

Everything else was nothing more than just static, a noise he couldn't control.

Sometimes he would doubt if he actually managed to know them or not, if he was projecting something onto them that didn't even exist.

How exactly was he supposed to know what his mind out mind was capable of? Where was he supposed to start? How was he supposed to unbreak himself from all of the torture that plagued him where sleeping was something of a nightmare in itself?

He didn't know.

He wondered and wondered.

He knew nothing.

It drove him mad.

The crappy little apartment that felt about as warm as it looked was a place he'd been calling home for the past couple of weeks. Nothing ever really felt warm before so it didn't bother him. Even he wasn't warm. Only cold. As cold as the metal arm feels to the touch. His eyes glanced down at the metal. Impersonal, cold , sticking out to anyone who dared to give him a glance, making him so utterly different than anyone else, and he just knew . He knew that was who he was and that was always the very thing he was going to be.

A monster, a machine.

Someone that wasn't worth a shred of human decency.

He didn't blame anyone for the way they reacted upon seeing it. they caused him to switch to gloves though. Even in the warm summer months he always has those gloves on.

For all he'd been through obnoxiously warm gloves with an obnoxiously warm jacket is not the biggest problem of his.

He kept a journal of things he remembered.

They were little

They meant even less.

They were all he had.

He sat there in the dark with only the light of the moon shining through, flesh arm resting on the windowsill as he tried his hardest to think of everything. It became something of a nightly routine.

Steve . He remembered Steve first. The scrawny little blonde kid he grew up with. His mom died. That's all he could really remember. Steve Rogers, Captain America. That was plastered everywhere and even if he didn't remember it, it was something he knew.

He was grateful for the way the information is everywhere. He thought of google as something of a blessing (the only one) as he read up about what the Winter Soldier was said to have done.

Somehow, he knew there were missing pieces that he didn't even know existed.

He just did.

A few things were like that...where he just knew something to be true, knew he is missing a piece, but cannot tell anyone why that was the truth.

It was fucking frustrating to say the least.

So frustrating.

He threw the journal across the room, with his metal arm, leaving a hole in the wall.

"What's new?" He mumbled to himself.

"Easy." Natasha said as she picked up the journal and hands it back to him.

"I thought you left."

"So did I." She paused, looking down at him. "Steve is worried."

" Steve… " The name came out soft, sometimes just sitting there and repeat the name over and over hoping he'll get a clearer picture. It hasn't come yet. "We grew up together."

She watched him as if he was suddenly going to have his hand around her throat. He didn't blame her.

"Natalia Romanova." He said quietly after a moment. The more time he spent around her the more his brain fought to figure out who she was, what she wanted, and why she was there. Why she has been in his life for months, no matter what, and he'd given her a few too many bruises for her to stay out of a kindness . It was the first time he said her name like that and he didn't read it, he knew it. That was her name. She might have been called Natasha by everyone else but to him, she was Natalia .

Her lips curved in the slightest. " James ."

She called him that every so often. No one called him that and he didn't let anyone, but with her he did. He just did. He didn't have a solid reason as to why either, just allowing for it to pass.

Then he reminded himself he had no answers.

"You know me?"

She answered after a slight hesitation, in the same manner she always did.. "I do."

"I wasn't a very good man." That he doesn't need to question. "I'm still not. I can make out things..little things...flashes. They don't really make sense but I know blood. If I know anything...I know blood."

"We all have red in our ledger."

It wasn't something he wanted to talk about. "Are you leaving?"

"I can spare a night."

* * *

Neither of them should have really taken the risk of going to Russia, but that was exactly what happened. Hardly as if they would go back after they were already there. If they needed to get out of the country for one reason or another they could. A calculated risk. Bucky didn't mind risks such as those, ones that hopefully pieced parts of him back together.

It took them weeks to eventually track down the facility Bucky saw in his dreams, nightmares , the very ones that caused him to bolt up in bed, sweating, unable to breath, unsure what to do with the little pieces of information.

"Anything?"

Bucky wanted to tell her that yes, everything came flooding back to him the moment the building was in view. He wanted to tell her that when they moved through the doorway there was something special and all of his unanswered questions were answered, that his fears weren't fears anymore, that everything was fine.

He did none of that.

Instead he just walked further through the threshold and allowed himself to look at the abandoned building. If he had to guess on just how long he'd of said since the fall of the USSR decades ago. So many people found freedom, even if they didn't actually move from Russia.

Freedom was nothing he obtained.

Instead he was a few months out of not being someone's prized possession. Months. He still had no idea what to do and where to start.

There, in the building, standing next to Nat that felt comfortable seemed like as good as place as any.

He needed answers if he was going to fight his demons.

His eyes followed her as she moved further in. There were moments in which he would catch himself staring at her and wanting to ask questions. He never did. Even when she would ask him if there was something on his mind he didn't bother to actually say anything. The fear of hearing an answer he didn't want to ruled him. It felt cowardly and it certainly was, but it was the only choice he felt he could make in the moment.

Nat stiffened immediately as she stopped in front of a large machine, wires falling to the side, something that had the ability to make him uneasy. Still, it didn't stop him from moving to stand next her.

"They put me in this."

"Yeah." Was all she said.

His fingers move along the machine, feeling as if he was taken back there, hooked up and frozen, somewhere he didn't want to be. He dared to glance over at Natasha and the look on her face easily told him an answer to a question he hadn't even thought to ask yet.

Grabbing his gun from where it was holstered on his hip he carefully moved through the rest of the empty building. Partially to see if he could find whatever it was he was looking for, but to also get away from the machine, finding it too difficult for him to be there before it.

Something was off about the building, one of those many things he simply couldn't put his finger on. He was just grateful that his instincts still managed to work. He moved through the rest of the building with Natasha next to him, finding themselves in a room upstairs, one that is mostly burned.

It didn't seem as if it held many answers.

"You okay, Barnes?"

"You don't have to keep tabs on me, Nat."

"I know." She spoke as she stood next to him. "But if you're going to go all Winter Solider on me I don't want to be shot."

"Again."

" Again ."

"I'm fine." It was a lie and he was perfectly aware that she knew just how much of a lie it was.

Nearly everything was burned in the room and they really shouldn't have even be in the room since the roof looks as if it was about to come caving down on them. The box in the corner caught his eye, leaning down to dig through it. Most everything was destroyed but the file he finds on the bottom is only burned around the edges. The paper was falling apart, probably due to age, not stopping him from opening it.

"How many assassinations did you leak?" Bucky asked as he looked over at Nat who moved to join him.

"Over two dozen assassinations. Names weren't released."

"Why not?"

"Because you wouldn't survive." She said casually. "They'd kill you."

"They already want to kill me." Sometimes he thought she was the only one who didn't want to kill him. A miracle in himself.

"This never happened." Natasha said as she took the piece of paper from him, folding it up and sticking it into her pocket.

Her actions immediately set a red flag off in him. "What aren't you telling me?"

"We need to go."

"Natalia."

"We need to go." She said more forcefully before the shots could be heard.

He didn't know where any of them came from and finding the source of the gunfire was a mission he wasn't successful at. He heard the bullet and yanked at Nat's arm as it ricocheted off of the cabinet and barely missed the two of them.

"Who are they?" He asked, peering over the small table that is their shelter for the moment.

"I don't know."

"The irony of this isn't lost on me." Was all he managed to mumble before the gun that was almost always hosted at this side returns the gun fire. The one man went down, a groan, Bucky hitting his side. Natasha was gone from his side at an instant, taking another man, causing him to groan in pain as he landed face first into the cement and was twisting his arm behind his back.

The third man came for him and within seconds his metal arm was at the man's throat.

"Who are you?" It was forceful, Winter Soldier , less Bucky. Something that made him comfortable yet uncomfortable.

"You think you and Widow can walk right into Russia and not be found? Careless." he spat out the words and Bucky had to do everything to keep himself from tightening his grip.

"Anything?" Bucky turned and asked Natasha.

"You or me?" She returned, her own grip tightening.

Bucky looked at the man and nothing came to mind. "Both."

"We'll be in touch." He said, his free hands causing him to open the jacket secure on his body. A bomb being exposed.

"Run." He ordered but she was already moving, finding the quickest way out of the building. They barely made it out before the whole thing exploded into a million little pieces. The sheer force of it sending them rolling down a bit of a hill.

"Ow." He muttered as his back hits a rock, looking over and seeing Nat managing to sit up.

"Whatever was in there they didn't want us to find."

"We're not going to find it now." Not when the whole damn place was going up in flames. They missed something. A list of assassinations wasn't going to do much. Not when the world thinks he did so many as it was.

When Nat stood so did he, following her lead away from the building.

"What did you see on there?"

She only looked at him for a brief moment but didn't managed to answer. Instead she carefully moved to stand by one of the trees.

At least until Bucky grabbed her by the arm. "Tell me."

Her eyes narrowed as she yanked her arm back. "I know a name on the list."

"That you didn't before?"

"There was a never reason to."

"Who?"

"Howard Stark." The name fell from her lips hesitantly.

Bucky stopped and pulled out the little notebook he kept in the pocket of his pants. "Stark." He repeated the name until it didn't even feel as if it's a real world anymore.

"Steve Rogers, Peggy Carter, Howard Stark." He muttered, stopping against a tree.

"Did you remember all those?" Her tone iwa gentler than usual.

"Did I kill Peggy too?" At this point he wouldn't be surprised.

"No." Natasha shook her head. "She's not dead."

"I hope that would mean more than it does." He put the notebook back in his pocket. "Come on, before they find us."

"James." She stopped him as he walks off only to not say anything more.

"It doesn't matter who made me a weapon. I still am one and I know what I did. I did them, 'tasha. No one else and that's never changing." He shrugged, finding it all to be facts. He could debate it forever but he knew what he did, even if he couldn't remember most of the assassinations he carried out.

"They don't define you."

"Nothing defines me."

* * *

"So you and Steve?" Bucky asked casually later once they were inside. They've both managed to shower and have food before them. A place that no one would actually want to be in but also a place where they wouldn't be found.

"Why are you saying it like that?"

Busted . "I'm not."

"i don't date Rogers. I set him up on dates he either doesn't go to or gives some excuse."

That earned a chuckle. It was small but there. Little flashes of Steve existed, not many, but enough. He knew who he was, certain memories came screaming back, but nothing that was a full picture. "Date anyone?"

"Shut up and eat your dinner."

He did just that. When he looked over at her though, he couldn't tell if what he felt was budding or if it was old. She felt familiar and he really liked that, liked the way that just sitting there and eating dinner with her was something right. He'll ask questions later when she lets him. The silence that hung in the air, however, was nice. It was rare to find that without feeling as if he was going to claw out of his skin.

"He always needed a push... Steve ." He clarified, making some type of conversation.

"He hasn't changed."

* * *

Natasha ended up needing to busy herself with Avengers business he didn't ask about. Having her there was nice but there was something to being alone he enjoyed. Probably because he was never alone before. They never wanted their best asset to get away. Then they would have to find someone else to do all their dirty work.

The silence only lasted so long before Bucky found that he couldn't sit around and do nothing. He needed more answers. He needed to see if there was more information out there than what little he had.

Which led him to a facility that was the former Red Room.

It was those moments that seemed to filter back into pieces...moments when he could remember smiling and almost as if he was part of himself. They were right by the moments of him and Steve running around as kids, getting into all kinds of trouble his mother scolded him for. Happy memories, as happy as his life in both situations could be.

He swallowed those thoughts away as he moved into the empty building, only to notice the red hair coming towards him. So much for being on his own.

"What are you doing here?" He asked and found he was actually kind of happy to see her.

"Thought I'd let you on your own, Barnes."

Bucky rolled his eyes but didn't lose the smile.

"How did you find this place?"

"I remembered it." He told her, walking through quietly, gun in hand.

"Did you…?"

Suddenly, a figure came out of seemingly nowhere. "It's almost as if you two wish to get captured."

The mysterious man was greeted with both Natasha and Bucky pointing their guns at him.

"Put those away, you won't be needing them."

Neither listened.

"HYDRA is looking for you," he spoke to Bucky, "and you, Miss Romanoff. Wanted woman. Defecting, brave, weak. These stories do not end with you. Quite a sight, you two in the company of another. I thought after you shot her you wouldn't wish to be in his company."

Bucky looked over at her for a brief moment, shaking his head. He didn't remember that.

"What do you want?" Natasha asked as her focus remains on him.

"Recover a tape." He shrugged his shoulders.

"And what do you want in return?" Bucky asked having half a mind to step forward. He didn't seem like he wanted to kill them but it was not a risk he wanted to take.

"We'll meet again."

"Who are you?"

"A friend," he smirked, "this is for your own benefit."

"I don't believe that."

"It doesn't matter what you believe, it's what you do." The man stepped forward and handed them a set of coordinates.

"Let him go." Bucky said against his own better judgment.

"You're not serious?" Nat looked at him, clear disbelief. "You don't trust him, do you?"

"No. We all start somewhere." He was willing to follow any thread that opened a door. "We started here."

"Asking or telling."

"Telling, Natalia." Bucky walked so he was closer to her.

"How much do you remember?"

"I remember a shower and your terrible American accent." He smirked then. Part of him wanted to run his fingers through her hair but he stopped himself. Only allowed for his gaze to remain on her. "It's improved."

"Shut up." She rolled her eyes but smiled all the same. "You were born in America. You cheated."

"I was born in America but I grew up here." It was the place in which he became the weapon that was standing right there with her.

"This place made a lot of people."

"Natalia," he whispered, finding himself near her, looking down, "I shot you."

She lifted her shirt. "We're better off not remembering that."

"I'm sorry." He said softly. "I would never hurt you." That he knew. "That's not me being nice, I mean it."

"I know."

"I remember loving you. Barely ." That hurt to say. "But standing here, it's like I'm clawing at myself to be closer."

"James."

"Yeah?" He asked softly.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"Everything." Was all she said.

He wondered if he'll ever know what it means. It didn't matter. "We should go." Before they fall into something too deep.

"Yeah," she cleared her throat. "We should."

* * *

"You didn't have to come with me." Bucky said as they stood hidden in the woods overlooking a large facility.

"You get into a lot of trouble on your own."

"Not that much." Bucky defended.

The look Natasha gave him wasn't missed. The moon was high in the sky as darkness fell over them, the last people going home for the evening. A guard stood in the front and another stood in the back. Poor security if he had ever seen it before.

"I'll take the front and you take the back."

"See you inside." Natasha replied with a smirk before she left him behind.

Bucky allowed her to go first and appreciated just how smoothly she moved, how trained she was. It was something he noticed when fighting her, the way she was able to anticipate his moves, the way she could bounce back from nearly anything. Just seeing her had pulled at something inside of him. So many memories he would have to work to get back, but enough to know she was someone very special to him. Made him think she could be again. A train of thoughts he shouldn't even entertain, not with everything that was going around him.

Once he saw her down there he made his way to the front door. The guard went down easily before Bucky was inside of the building.

He remembered that place.

He wished he didn't.

Bucky chose not to deal with it and instead walked into the center of the building. The room with the computers was already busted open, Nat bending over the table and looking through a bunch of boxes.

"How long before an alarm goes off?" Bucky asked as his gun was tucked into it's holster.

"Two minutes." Nat answered, looking back at him briefly. "Old school. Look for the tapes."

"Classic."

Nat smirked. "Old, classic. They are both the same." She stood up, walking over to him. "Found them."

* * *

"We don't have to keep watching these." Nat said as she sat on the edge of the bed next to him.

"Hit play."

" James ."

His voice softened. "Just play it."

Nat hit the play button and he watched himself on the screen with a dead look in his eyes as he carried out a mission. He wondered why these were even taped. Probably to put more pressure on him in case he stepped out of line. That time his arm ended up being the true weapon and he watched as the poor person died.

They were on the fourth video and each time he played another he tensed up. He was sure the man who led us there wanted to do in order to torture him. They were answers he wanted regardless.

"I need to take my arm off." It was a sudden need that felt almost as if it came out of nowhere, but was something that was consistently the source of all of his power. He knew he couldn't just rip it off but it didn't stop him from wanting to. His other arm moved, tugging, attempting, yanking, being entirely irrational. There was a pain. He didn't care. He'd rather have no arm than that one.

"You're going to hurt yourself." Natasha stood up and stopped his actions.

"Better me than anyone else." Bucky whispered. "You saw those tapes."

"They weren't you. You did them but you wouldn't have done them if you had a choice."

"Would you?"

"We've been made into these people. You can either run from it or not."

"I'm tired of running." He was also tired of existing but he didn't tell her that part. He didn't want to drag her into his demons. "I always had a thing for redheads."

"I remember you being smoother."

Bucky smirked, shaking his head. "So, you're not dating Steve?"

"No."

"Good." Bucky whispered just barely before he pulled her towards him, kissing her. He didn't know if she was going to kiss him back until she did. It was definitely not anything that he would consider a good idea. She knew so much more than he did. She had the complete picture and he had nothing but mere flashes. It was just so hard to care when everything was so messed up and she was there.

The only source of comfort he had.

"James."

"Do you want me to stop?" He asked, pulling back just slightly.

" No ."

Bucky was glad to hear that and let out a smile as she shoved him back down against the bed. He turned his brain off then, not willing to let this moment be tainted with something of the past. Not when she was right there and her hair was cascading down, causing him to run his fingers through it.

"Why did you come here?"

Natasha tore her gaze away from his. "It's not the first time. The only difference is I found you this time."

"I'm not worried about staying hidden."

"Steve is trying to find you. I haven't told him."

"You can." Bucky decided. "I'm not the same kid anymore. Wasn't the same kid once I fighting out there in the war, but then this," he motioned to his arm, "happened. They happened. He's good. I'm not."

"You don't have to be what you were." Natasha sat up but remained straddling him. "No one is going to expect that out of you."

"None of it changes what I did." Something that he just couldn't manage to escape. He did everything and they would remain with him forever.

"I saw you in that machine." She swallowed, daring to look back at him. "It's my last memory before you shot me. I know you're not the man back then and I know you're a good man, deep down."

Bucky remained silent as he looked up at her. The pain in her eyes spoke to him in a way that her words simply didn't.

"After that I knew what it was going to be like," she continued. "What they would be like, but we're here now."

"Yeah." He whispered, "we are." Something he had to remind himself...that they were there. Alive. Breathing. Free of everything that plagued them, him. "I don't think I can do this."

"You have a second chance."

"It's better if I stay away."

"I thought that once." Natasha grabbed onto his metal hand, "that it would be better if I continued in my ways, but I got a chance. I am wiping all of the bad I did. It won't ever be right and I'll never change from that person, but trying...that's the important part. I found a home in that."

"But you're here with me." When she didn't say anything he continued, "I don't want to hurt anyone. You shouldn't even be here now. Anything could happen."

"You can't hurt Steve. You tried to kill him and he's still alive." Her eyes shifted focus to his arm. "Being made a weapon is nothing you can control, but it doesn't make that the only thing you are, James."

Part of him felt as if he was pushing back just to push back. That he could run through every single excuse in the book but they would always end up being nothing more than a series of excuses. That if he was going to live his life he should actually live it. Hiding with nothing and no one was not going to do any good for him, no good for Steve, no good for Natalia.

He needed to live a life worth living.

Throwing away a second chance seemed...something he shouldn't do.

"I need to answer for the things I've done." It was the only way that he was going to find any semblance of peace, and whatever happened with that...happened. He knew all too well just how much he was never going to be able to control about his life and his past. "And I don't think I can do that if I'm here."

To Nat's credit she didn't give an expression one way or another.

"As long as I can still make-out with you." His lips curved into a smirk. It was something similar to a mask, but something that also had a certain genuine air about it...at least with her. Whatever happened, happened, but he wouldn't be him if he didn't take the night before them for whatever it was.

That earned a smile, her leaning down to brush her lips against his own. "Yeah, I can agree to that compromise, Loverboy ."


End file.
